Now it's Friday and an application of strong liquor will be coming my way very soon.....mixed with ginger ale and sipped with the greatest of pleasure. Not too much as I've my annual eye test in the morning and it wouldn't do if they were crossed and bloodshot

Frustrated and angry at East Hampshire District Council. Despite all of our objections the planning officer in charge of the case looks set to recommend permission to build the 80 near us

His report runs to over 50 pages so I won't bore you with all his flawed arguments.

However, my disbelief and frustration with the system stems from the fact that only 2 weeks ago EHDC formally put in place their Joint Core Strategy - an official document laying out where new housing should be located within the whole EHD area.

The 2 villages of Four Marks/Medstead were 'allocated' 175 houses to be built between now and 2028 (although this would be reviewd in 5 years).

Now over 100 of this figure have already been given permission, so another 80 will take us over that figure. The councils argument seems to be that national legislation gives presumtion that as long as the building is sustainable it must be allowed

We were hoping that this would be a test case and EHDC would actually grow a pair and refuse this.

Formal voting by committee is due to take place on the 23rd. We will turn out in force to show our case, but as residents we are only allowed a single 3 minute slot to talk to the committee. The Parish Council also get 3 minutes. But I can't see EHDC voting against their planning officer's report recommendation.

So if this is allowed we have the following developments already being touted by developers.

I'm soon gonna be living in an urban sprawl, not a village. There will be no water pressure, the roads will break up further under weight of traffic, you won't get to see a Dr or get a school place, the place will stink of sewerage (as the sewerage systems fail, which all the new systems do on our soil).......but it doesn't matter to the developers - they will have left and moved on to rape some more of our countryside for profit.

I know how you feel about your issues about your town planning committee I had the almost the same issues 4 years ago my local area tried to stop a cricket club being built right smack next door to me ripping up a large open area of land and destroying the habitat of many species of fauna and flora resorting to dirty tricks for example drilling for methane pockets in the middle of a skylark nesting ground during the middle of nesting season, hiring "local" gangs to set fires across the field and increased vandalism and theft within the surrounding area using the field to escape to. Now we get a fair amount of field fires anyway dry grass etc.. but it increased 5 fold during the time the time that they were applying for planning permission and last of all and this is two fold making empty promises to the local schools that the waterways that host a large amount of different species of frogs, toads and newts would be made into a wildlife reserve whilst re-routing the underground streams that feed those very same waterways which they had absolutely no authority to do either.

janet wrote:Quite understandable Chilli. The situation seems to get worse with every report but that many extra properties springing up in a few short years is way OTT

We've tried asking the council why they don't look at the whole situation - i.e. all planning for all the developments as a whole - makes much more sense to see what a strain it puts on the infrastructure.........but no.....they have to look at each separate development in isolation.......madness

Chilli, I'm so sorry. Makes you wonder if they're really that short-sighted, or if their pockets are getting lined. Or, sometimes the laws are slanted so heavily in favor of the developers that the councils end up having no real power.

“It is the peculiar nature of the world to go on spinning no matter what sort of heartbreak is happening.”― Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees: